PAMCo Appoints Ipsos MORI and New Chair

The Publishers Audience Measurement Company (PAMCo) - the replacement for the UK's NRS - has appointed Ipsos MORI to provide the published media industry's new audience measurement service; and has named Aviva Group Brand Director Jan Gooding as its new Chair.

Earlier this year, PAMCo replaced the National Readership Survey (NRS), which had provided audience readership research through its continuous survey since 1956 and its online PADD measurement service since 2012. The change was initiated by publishers calling for a review of the NRS, and PAMCo is intended to reflect today's multi-platform media landscape.

After an agency review, the organisation has appointed Ipsos MORI, whose new measurement approach was developed in partnership with comScore and includes a 5,000 strong digital panel, supplementing 35,000 face-to-face interviews. The panel will deliver single-source data on participants' reading behaviour across all digital platforms, and will provide direct observations on print and digital duplication for the first time. Until the new service comes fully on-stream in 2017, PAMCo will take responsibility for managing NRS audience estimates.

Gooding (pictured) takes charge with a remit to oversee the strategic thinking of PAMCo's Board of Directors, and work alongside CEO Simon Redican and the rest of the team. She has more than 30 years' marketing and ad industry experience in senior roles at Aviva, British Gas, Antennae, BT, and BLUEdOOR, and she is also the Chair of LGBT equality charity Stonewall.

Commenting on the news, Redican said: 'Jan's appointment will really help PAMCo to land the benefits that the new system offers to the published media sector, agencies and the all-important advertisers. Ipsos MORI impressed stakeholders by proposing a brand new methodology which will transform the way published media audiences can be planned, bought and sold. For the first time, buyers and sellers can look at total de-duplicated reach across publisher platforms and transact on this information'.

A web site for the organisation is pending...